1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an airflow generating device which discharges gas and an electronic apparatus including the airflow generating device.
2. Description of the Related Art
Hitherto, an increase in the performance of a personal computer (PC) has caused an increase in the amount of heat generated from a heating element such as an integrated circuit (IC). Therefore, various heat-dissipation technologies or products have been proposed. Examples of heat-dissipation methods include the following. In one method, heat is dissipated by bringing a radiating fin, formed of a metal such as aluminum, into contact with an IC and conducting heat from the IC to the radiating fin. In another method, a fan is used to dissipate heat. The fan, for example, forcefully removes air warmed in a housing of a personal computer and introduces surrounding low-temperature air to the vicinity of a heating element. In still another method, a radiating fin and a fan are both used to dissipate heat. With the radiating fin increasing the area of contact between a heating element and air, the fan forcefully removes warmed air existing around the radiating fin.
However, in forceful convection of air with such a fan, a temperature boundary layer at a surface of the fin is produced at a downstream side of the fin, thereby giving rise to the problem that the heat from the radiating fin is not efficiently removed. This problem may be solved by, for example, reducing the thickness of the temperature boundary layer by increasing fan air velocity. However, increasing the rotational speed of the fan for the purpose of increasing the fan air velocity causes noise to be generated, such as noise from a fan bearing or noise of wind produced by the fan.
Methods using a vibrating plate that reciprocates periodically (refer to, for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication Nos. 2000-223871 (FIG. 2), 2000-114760 (FIG. 1), 2-213200 (FIG. 1), and 3-116961 (FIG. 3)) are available as methods which efficiently allow heat from a radiating fin to escape to outside air by destroying the temperature boundary layer without using a fan as an air blower. Of devices in these four documents, in particular, the devices in Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication Nos. 2-213200 and 3-116961 include a vibrating plate which roughly divides space in a chamber in two, a resilient member disposed in the chamber and supporting the vibrating plate, and a unit which vibrates the vibrating plate. In these devices, for example, when the vibrating plate is displaced upwards, the volume of an upper space of the chamber is reduced. Therefore, the pressure in the upper space is increased. Since the upper space is connected to outside air through a suction-exhaust opening, a portion of the air in the upper space is discharged to the outside air by the pressure increase in the upper space. At this time, the volume of a lower space that is opposite to the upper space (the vibrating plate is disposed between the lower space and the upper space) is increased, causing the pressure in the lower space to decrease. Since the lower space is connected to the outside air through a suction-exhaust opening, the pressure reduction in the lower space causes a portion of the outside air existing near the suction-exhaust opening to be sucked into the lower space. In contrast, when the vibrating plate is displaced downwards, the volume of the upper space of the chamber is increased. Therefore, the pressure in the upper space is decreased. Since the upper space is connected to the outside air through the suction-exhaust opening, the pressure reduction in the upper space causes a portion of the outside air existing near the suction-exhaust opening to be sucked into the upper space. At this time, the volume of the lower space that is opposite to the upper space (the vibrating plate is disposed between the lower space and the upper space as mentioned above) is decreased, causing the pressure in the lower space to increase. The pressure increase in the lower space causes a portion of the air in the lower space to be discharged to the outside air. The vibrating plate is driven by, for example, an electromagnetic driving method. Accordingly, by reciprocating the vibrating plate, the discharging of the air in the chamber to the outside air and the sucking of the outside air into the chamber are periodically repeated. Pulsating air induced by a periodic reciprocating movement of the vibrating plate is blown against a heating element such as the radiating fin (heat sink), so that the temperature boundary layer at the surface of the radiating fin is efficiently broken, as a result of which the radiating fin is cooled with high efficiency.